Armour of King Charles I as a Boy

Description

The third of the museum’s collection of Stuart royal armours, this one is most likely to have been made for Charles I as Prince of Wales, and subsequently worn by Charles II as Prince. It is another fine example of Dutch decorated armour of the early 17th century. Unfortunately no contemporary accounts or documents have so far been found to confirm the identification.

Unlike the earlier armours, this one is a small field garniture, comprising a complete field armour for a boy, with a shaffron and saddle steels, and a shield, short tassets and a pot for wear on foot. The whole armour is decorated with punched, engraved and gilt ornament, and the steel background was originally black (it is seen quite clearly in Dobson’s portrait of the future Charles II). The punched and incised ornament seen on this group of Dutch armours seems completely to have replaced the etched decoration that was standard for armour of high quality in the previous century. It seems also to have been a Dutch innovation, which was copied by armourers in England for the remainder of the century.

The armour is worn by Charles II as Prince of Wales in the portrait painted by William Dobson in Oxford in 1644 when the Prince was fourteen years of age, and had already seen active service in the first Civil War. However, it is also used in portraits of adults, for example Dobson’s portrait of Sir William Farmor of Easton-Neston, and the portrait of King William III as Prince of Orange, Dutch, about 1677, after Sir Peter Lely (Royal Armouries no. I.40). The armour said to have been presented by the town of Nancy to the Duc de Bourgogne in the Musée de l’Armée, Paris, is almost identical.

Tower arsenal. Probably brought to the Tower in 1649 by Edward Annesley, ‘One Small Field Armor of his late Matie’. Used as the figure of Charles Prince of Wales in the Line after Meyrick’s 1826-27 reorganisation, redisplayed by 1859 on foot, but by 1877 back on a horse; Britton 1830, no. 17; Hewitt 1859, II.68